The Fucked Up Beat – The Rust Belt 1961/The Rust Belt 1968 8.0

The Fucked Up Beat creates a noir electronic vibe on this double album. Samples are
generously dolloped on top of each song. Beats are put far back into the mix.
Mood here is more important than any outright drum programming. Oftentimes the
samples make up the core of the song as The Fucked Up Beat works around them.
With the dark atmosphere comes a rather developed sense of humor, almost cynical
in nature. These samples come from various catalogs for a time long ago giving
the album a sense of nostalgia, almost a polite mocking of the positive
samples, none of which ended up being true.

One of
the first examples of a successful merge of past and present is ‘The Mysterions’
which has both modern flourishes (the keyboards and percussion) alongside
multiple samples (from movies, jazz, etc.). ‘The Wonderous Future World of 1960’
has a calm approach to its use of an optimistic speaker as he states ‘Lets
travel into the future’. It is rather catchy in its simplicity. ‘The Deluge In
Flatlands’ is a dance piece, dark in execution and rather beautiful in its use
of violin and movie samples. ‘Lake Erie Body Snatchers’ mocks the speaker’s
discussion of socialism.

Atmosphere
is the biggest attraction of the album. Reference to Daedelus’s early work is
apparent in its usage of basic rhythm structures and heavy sampling. Many of
these songs barely possess any percussion at all. The mix between The Fucked Up
Beat’s contribution and the samples is a delicate balance. Overall it is a unified sound which dominates this double album.